I seriously can’t piece a 4 patch.

June 14, 2008

However! For some reason I have no problem piecing 45 degree diamonds all on the bias no less! Don’t ask me how because I assume the devil had something to do with it.

Anyway, I’ve been turning these damn 1.5 inch circles ALL night. I was talking to my BFF Roger and I determined it took me about 3 minutes to cut out the foundation, paste it down, trim it, and turn the edges. This is Sharon Schamber’s method of appliqué which meant that to do the circles in all the diamonds would have taken me six hours which doesn’t count ANY stitching.

Yeah, I’m far too pretty to spend six hours of my life turning circles and then probably 3 days sewing them down. Wayyyy too pretty. I’m doing it a little differently than she does. I did heat set the foundation, but I didn’t heat set as i turned each edge. I have an 80$ iron and I’m tired of cleaning off burnt glue every ten minutes. So I turned them all then heat them all at once between some foil which actually made them a lot smoother, I guess because it made the ironing hotter? Who knows.

She also recommends a stitch length of 1.0 and a width of .9. Yeah, I don’t think so. That looks like mono filament satin stitching. I did a length of 2.0 and a width of 1.3. Not only does it look better but it goes MUCH faster.

I’m still not understanding how she’s fixing her stops and starts. She said she uses the fix stitch (we have the same machine) and mine is making a rather big knot when I use the knot. Whatever. I’m working it out.

I’ve drafted the corner setting squares (they’re curved seams) and I’m drafting the triangles tomorrow. Then I just have to figure out some borders and whether or not it’ll end up on point like my last lonestar.

I think it might end up on point too! Big corner triangles for lots of fancy quilting!